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Sunday, July 22, 2012

Google buys Sparrow

Just when I thought I had worked out the problems I was having with various email programs, Sparrow announced it was being purchased by Google. After working through Microsoft Outlook, Mozilla Thunderbird, Apple Mail and a few others, without success in getting my email straightened out, I had finally decided to use Sparrow as a reasonable alternative.

Sparrowmailapp.com has been very stable and a good email client for the last couple of months. Now this, it is purchased by Google. Let's just say that my opinion of Google Mail is very poor. I have lost two email addresses, and very good addresses at that, to unexplained and unexplainable crashes. One of the addresses works very infrequently but the other is dead, dead, dead. Having your email address crash is like being forcibly ejected from your house or apartment; you have to establish a whole new email address and who knows what you miss in the meantime.

Lately, I have tried to hedge my losses by having a backup Yahoo.com address, just in case. But Sparrow was working so well, I had almost forgotten my plans. Now, I will have to get busy again and make sure I have a viable contingency. Just in case one of my Google Mail addresses decides to go visit its relatives in outer darkness.

I am not so certain that this endless round of big companies eating up smaller companies is such a great benefit to the consumers. I am guessing that the Sparrow service I have had for the last while, will get worse and probably have a cost associated with it. I am a big fan of Google, but they have a dark underside. They continually monetize their products, like Google Drive, that went from a free service to a paid one and then jumped over 10 times in cost. Most of the Google components are still technically free, but for how long? Especially when they finish buying up the competition.